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ventaI'm currently enjoying a nice quiet evening at home to recover from the exertions of the weekend. The weekend was quite exerting because Boojum, my occasional rapper team, and I were camping out in a large, cold and dusty hall, practising, and going out on tour. And, to be fair, staying up late and drinking.
In January 2000 I travelled up to Sheffield to meet a bunch of people I barely knew. A couple of months earlier Jean, whom I knew vaguely to say hello to, had phoned me to invite me to join a new rapper team she was putting together. One of the originals subsequently dropped out, and two new members joined. One person is currently on indefinite sabbatical, leaving six of us dancers, plus a musician, a Tommy and a spare bloke. Despite differences in age, circumstance and location, we've actually formed into quite a close circle of friends.
During the time the team's been going we've drunk our way through a large quantity of red wine, bitched our way around the British folk scene, planned, plotted and laughed a lot. Only really this weekend did I notice that, along with everything else, we make a good support circle. In the five and a bit years we've been going we've talked each other through relationship crises, family deaths and terminal illnesses, injury, career changes and problems with children.
I am the youngest Boojum; I think the eldest is more than 25 years my senior. We are distributed between Canterbury and North Shields, and meet only a few times a year. For a bunch of people selected haphazardly by Jean a few years ago, we're not doing badly.
The entirely serendipitous thing about Boojum is that, together, we seem to be a weirdness and incident magnet. OK, so people dressed outlandishly attract attention. Trefor (our substitute Tommy, called into action on Saturday because our usual Tommy had been taken violently ill during the day) in full evening dress and silk topper, always draws enquiring glances - he looks like a railway baron and plays up to the image, lifting his top hat to cars who slow to let us cross roads. If you walk into a pub and start causing havoc, the pub's resident nutter will gravitate towards you. Even so, with Boojum more than any other team plain weird stuff seems to come our way.
On Saturday night, we'd gone to The Big Bang in Jericho for a meal - and thoroughly enjoyed our gourmet bangers and mash there. Just as we were musing on the bill and how to split it, the proprietor wandered over to our table and said "I'm sory, I have to ask. What are you lot doing?" He conceded that Trefor looked "damn gorgeous", but he wanted to know why.
By way of answer, Rhian pulled a rapper sword from the bag and said "that's why". Instead of pointing out that that wasn't really much of an explanation, he shot off, and returned with a dress sword of his own. He drew it with a flourish, plonked it down on the table proudly, then proceded to enquire further.
We explained. I asked what he did with his sword; he answered that he mostly used it for opening champagne. We immediately clamoured for more information. A bottle of champagne was produced, and eventually the bargain was struck that he would demonstrate opening the champagne if we would dance.
It's called sabrage, and relies on certain structural properties of champagne bottles. If you strike the neck, hard, with a blade the bottle sheers off just below the annulus, leaving an open bottle with a lethal edge and a cork with a neat collar of glass (intact) around it. It's bloody impressive - the more so because I'd never even heard it before.
We kept our bargain and danced, on the little patch of tiles at the top of the stairs (apologising profusely to the slightly bemused couple whom the proprietor had summarily relocated, along with their table, practically onto the stairs to give us space). We then paid our bill, and left.
Accordingly, Designated Hero of the Week for this week is Max, of The Big Bang: firstly for running a damn fine eatery, but mostly for providing us with a thoroughly unexpected moment of surrealism, and for being a dab hand at sabrage.
My second surprise of the evening came towards the end of the tour. Nearing the completion of our route through Jericho (and can I just say what utterly fabulous and friendly pubs Jericho has ?) we called into the Plantation Road Gardener's Arms[*]. I'd agreed dancing there with the landlord earlier in the week, but he was out of sight. I explained to the barmaid, and she asked what we were going to do.
I drew a long breath, and started on the explanation: it's a sword dance from the north east of England... "Oooh", she interrupted, "are you going to do rapper?"
That took the wind out of my sails. "I'm from Sunderland", she explained, "and I did the rapper workshops at Whitby festival a couple of years ago." I guess it had to happen some time :)
The accolade of DHW is already taken but I salute (in turn) The Royal Oak, The Victoria, The Old Bookbinder's Arms, The Gardener's Arms (PR), and The Rose & Crown. Jericho really does have some fantastic pubs.
[*] For those not familiar with Jericho (which, incidentally, is an area of North Oxford), there are two pubs called the Gardener's Arms, so they have to be distinguished with road names. They're a couple of hundred yards from each other. Why yes, since you ask, it does cause some terrible confusion sometimes. I always get lost in Jericho, and was actually looking for the North Parade Gardener's Arms when I found the Plantation Rd one. Which turned out to be a wonderful pub with great beer, and had a lovely and enthusiastic crowd in on Saturday night. When I found the one I was looking for, it turned out to be carpeted and thus no use to me at all.
In January 2000 I travelled up to Sheffield to meet a bunch of people I barely knew. A couple of months earlier Jean, whom I knew vaguely to say hello to, had phoned me to invite me to join a new rapper team she was putting together. One of the originals subsequently dropped out, and two new members joined. One person is currently on indefinite sabbatical, leaving six of us dancers, plus a musician, a Tommy and a spare bloke. Despite differences in age, circumstance and location, we've actually formed into quite a close circle of friends.
During the time the team's been going we've drunk our way through a large quantity of red wine, bitched our way around the British folk scene, planned, plotted and laughed a lot. Only really this weekend did I notice that, along with everything else, we make a good support circle. In the five and a bit years we've been going we've talked each other through relationship crises, family deaths and terminal illnesses, injury, career changes and problems with children.
I am the youngest Boojum; I think the eldest is more than 25 years my senior. We are distributed between Canterbury and North Shields, and meet only a few times a year. For a bunch of people selected haphazardly by Jean a few years ago, we're not doing badly.
The entirely serendipitous thing about Boojum is that, together, we seem to be a weirdness and incident magnet. OK, so people dressed outlandishly attract attention. Trefor (our substitute Tommy, called into action on Saturday because our usual Tommy had been taken violently ill during the day) in full evening dress and silk topper, always draws enquiring glances - he looks like a railway baron and plays up to the image, lifting his top hat to cars who slow to let us cross roads. If you walk into a pub and start causing havoc, the pub's resident nutter will gravitate towards you. Even so, with Boojum more than any other team plain weird stuff seems to come our way.
On Saturday night, we'd gone to The Big Bang in Jericho for a meal - and thoroughly enjoyed our gourmet bangers and mash there. Just as we were musing on the bill and how to split it, the proprietor wandered over to our table and said "I'm sory, I have to ask. What are you lot doing?" He conceded that Trefor looked "damn gorgeous", but he wanted to know why.
By way of answer, Rhian pulled a rapper sword from the bag and said "that's why". Instead of pointing out that that wasn't really much of an explanation, he shot off, and returned with a dress sword of his own. He drew it with a flourish, plonked it down on the table proudly, then proceded to enquire further.
We explained. I asked what he did with his sword; he answered that he mostly used it for opening champagne. We immediately clamoured for more information. A bottle of champagne was produced, and eventually the bargain was struck that he would demonstrate opening the champagne if we would dance.
It's called sabrage, and relies on certain structural properties of champagne bottles. If you strike the neck, hard, with a blade the bottle sheers off just below the annulus, leaving an open bottle with a lethal edge and a cork with a neat collar of glass (intact) around it. It's bloody impressive - the more so because I'd never even heard it before.
We kept our bargain and danced, on the little patch of tiles at the top of the stairs (apologising profusely to the slightly bemused couple whom the proprietor had summarily relocated, along with their table, practically onto the stairs to give us space). We then paid our bill, and left.
Accordingly, Designated Hero of the Week for this week is Max, of The Big Bang: firstly for running a damn fine eatery, but mostly for providing us with a thoroughly unexpected moment of surrealism, and for being a dab hand at sabrage.
My second surprise of the evening came towards the end of the tour. Nearing the completion of our route through Jericho (and can I just say what utterly fabulous and friendly pubs Jericho has ?) we called into the Plantation Road Gardener's Arms[*]. I'd agreed dancing there with the landlord earlier in the week, but he was out of sight. I explained to the barmaid, and she asked what we were going to do.
I drew a long breath, and started on the explanation: it's a sword dance from the north east of England... "Oooh", she interrupted, "are you going to do rapper?"
That took the wind out of my sails. "I'm from Sunderland", she explained, "and I did the rapper workshops at Whitby festival a couple of years ago." I guess it had to happen some time :)
The accolade of DHW is already taken but I salute (in turn) The Royal Oak, The Victoria, The Old Bookbinder's Arms, The Gardener's Arms (PR), and The Rose & Crown. Jericho really does have some fantastic pubs.
[*] For those not familiar with Jericho (which, incidentally, is an area of North Oxford), there are two pubs called the Gardener's Arms, so they have to be distinguished with road names. They're a couple of hundred yards from each other. Why yes, since you ask, it does cause some terrible confusion sometimes. I always get lost in Jericho, and was actually looking for the North Parade Gardener's Arms when I found the Plantation Rd one. Which turned out to be a wonderful pub with great beer, and had a lovely and enthusiastic crowd in on Saturday night. When I found the one I was looking for, it turned out to be carpeted and thus no use to me at all.
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Date: 2006-04-10 10:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-10 10:32 pm (UTC)We must be able to find three more!
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Date: 2006-04-11 11:10 am (UTC)3) The Cambridge Blue...
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Date: 2006-04-11 11:29 am (UTC)Start packing, Liz!
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Date: 2006-04-11 11:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 12:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 12:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-10 11:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 08:05 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 08:05 am (UTC)